Using the Vacu Vin Wine Vacuum to Keep Coffee Beans Fresh
I had a (retrospectively quite obvious) brain storm the other day that I wish I had had several years ago. You can use the Vacu Vin wine preservation system to keep coffee beans fresh too. It’s awesome.
Basically, Vacu Vin is a Dutch company that came up with an easy to use vacuum apparatus that sucks the air out of partially-empty bottles of wine. The oxygen in air oxidizes and acidifies the wine, and makes it turn sour. With most of the oxygen removed, wine stays fresh for much longer. I’ve had a Vacu Vin vacuum pump thing for a little while now, and it’s great - no longer am I forced to drink a full bottle of wine in one sitting, just so it doesn’t go bad.
My brainstorm was: you can do the same thing with coffee.
- Wash out and dry an empty bottle of wine. The type of wine doesn’t matter, but the color of the bottle does: the darker the glass, the less light can get in to spoil the beans. Alternately, keep your coffee in a dark kitchen cabinet. Make sure the bottle is completely dry on the inside - you don’t want water in there, letting you coffee beens rot.
- Make or find a suitable funnel. If you already have a funnel with a wide-enough mouth for coffee beans to easily fit through, then great. If you don’t, I would advise making one for yourself. The easiest way to do it is to cut the top off of an empty plastic bottle. I used a Coke bottle, and it worked great.
- Using the funnel that you’ve made or bought, pour the coffee beans in to the empty bottle. A regular-sized wine bottle will hold 750ml of coffee beans, or about one pound.
- Use the Vacu Vin pump and stopper to suck all of the air out of the wine bottle. It’ll take a couple strokes, depending on how many beans are in there; you know you’re done when the stopper makes a clicking sound.
That is pretty much it. I had been keeping my coffee beans in a clear semi-airtight plastic jar for a long time, and I think this will keep them a lot more fresh than with my previous system.
Photos
This is the vacuum-sealed bottle, with beans.
This is the funnel I made. I used a steak knife to cut the plastic bottle, so it’s not very nice-looking, but it does work well.
This is the Vacu Vin stopper and pump. You can get them on Amazon or any type of “foodie” store.
Posted on Nov 23, 2008 - 09:55 PM
Comments:
I had a similar brainwave(actually my wife did even though I will deny this locally). I was concerned that the aperture would be too small and the beans would get stuck, but it works fine. As I only did this tonight I am yet to find out if it keeps them fresh enough to maintain flavour.
By .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) on Dec 16, 2010 - 06:01 PM
